South Korea's president last week offered to meet with North Korean leader Kim Jong Il at "any time and anywhere" in order to break the impasse over the North's nuclear program, the Yonhap News Agency reported (see GSN, Nov. 25).
"I have no political reason to hold a summit (with Kim), but I can meet him at any time if it will help convince North Korea to give up its nuclear programs and resolve humanitarian issues," President Lee Myung-bak said in a television broadcast.
Though the nations' last two summits were held in North Korea -- suggesting that the next meeting should take place in Seoul -- Lee said he would waive that right "because the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula is such an important issue, I plan to meet (Kim) at any time and anywhere as long as our objective of such a summit will be achieved."
Lee said that any conversations between Seoul and Pyongyang would be held in the open and not secretly.
There have been recent media reports of a secret meeting in Singapore between senior officials from the two countries in which a possible summit between two leaders was rumored to have been debated (Byun Duk-kun, Yonhap News Agency I, Nov. 28).
A South Korean Foreign Ministry official today played down the chances of significant progress being made during U.S. special envoy Stephen Bosworth's upcoming negotiating trip to North Korea. The diplomat is set to travel to the North on Dec. 8; he is expected to try and persuade Pyongyang to return to the halted six-nation nuclear talks, Yonhap reported.
"We are seeing no signals from North Korea yet that it would return to the six-party talks," the official said. "As for now, we see the prospects are dark."
The six states -- China, Japan, Russia, the United States and both Koreas -- last conducted full nuclear talks nearly one year ago. Since leaving the negotiations, North Korea carried out a second nuclear test and announced that it had resumed plutonium reprocessing, which it had suspended during the denuclearization process (Yonhap News Agency II, Nov. 29).
The Japanese newspaper Sankei Shimbun reported, though, that the North had told Washington that it would "present the schedule on when it will return to the talks if Mr. Bosworth's visit comes true."
"North Korea probably decided to give a 'souvenir' (to Bosworth) as it has been craving direct talks with the Untied States," a Japanese Foreign Ministry official said (Agence France-Presse/Spacewar.com, Nov. 30).
A South Korean expert speculated Friday that contact with higher-level U.S. diplomats, such as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, would be needed to persuade North Korea to return to nuclear negotiations, Yonhap reported.
During Bosworth's trip to North Korea, "the two sides may discuss various issues, but higher-level dialogue will be needed to confirm any decision," said Nam Sung-wook, a national security adviser to President Lee. "I do not expect any headline news from Ambassador Bosworth's visit, but I would do so if other high-level talks are held" (Lee Chi-dong, Yonhap News Agency III, Nov. 27).
Meanwhile, Pyongyang on Friday renewed its claim that it is a recognized holder of nuclear weapons by pointing to a November report by the Federation of American Scientists that listed it and eight other nations as having nuclear arms, the Korea Herald reported (see GSN, Nov. 18).
Yonhap reported that the North's official Korean Central News Agency said "the Federation of American Scientists of the United States has confirmed (North) Korea as a nuclear-weapon state."
Widespread foreign recognition of the North as a nuclear-weapon state has been withheld in order to limit the country's claims to international legal validation of its atomic ambitions (Korea Herald, Nov. 27).
"It’s certainly curious that they would need our reaffirmation, but after two nuclear tests we feel it is safe to call North Korea a nuclear-weapon state," responded Hans Kristensen, head of the organization's Nuclear Information Project and a co-author of the report.
He noted, though, that "two experimental nuclear test explosions don't make a nuclear arsenal" and that North Korea has yet to demonstrate that it is capable of placing nuclear weapons on delivery systems (Hans Kristensen, Federation of American Scientists, Nov. 27).